Attic of Fame part 5: My dad

My fifth inductee.

I started the Attic of Fame series to explore the hidden oddities of otherwise seemingly normal things. I’ve covered the Queen, cornflakes and the 1900 Olympics. Please indulge me this week as I’d like to induct my dad. He would’ve loved to be in such grand company (especially the Queen) and like the Queen, he is no longer with us.

I think he would be happy to be featured here. He listened to my posts each week and wasn’t just my cheerleader but the full Dallas Cowboys squad jumping up and landing in the splits. Which was something he would try to do if anyone, in his later years, dared to offer him a seat on the tube. I’m only exaggerating slightly.

I’ve written about him many times before and I’m sure this won’t be the last. But here is some of what I’ve learned about my dad’s micro-oddities from the last 49 years.

Answering the phone

Our home telephone number growing up was 58980. My dad was of a generation who would answer a call with their phone number. I’m only questioning now why anybody did this. I’m going to guess it dates back to the line being connected manually so was open to human error. But surely that was 1348 years ago? Anyway, I lie slightly when I say he greeted a caller with, “58980”. What he actually said, for reasons I never got to the bottom of, was just the last two digits: “Eight Oh!” Every time.

I also need to point out now that my parents moved house thirty years ago and had an entirely different landline number which very much did not end in ‘80’ and yet he STILL said “Eight Oh” at the start of every call.

I’ve never considered until now what other people thought of this greeting. A cold caller might have been used to the occasional old lady with her, “Bedford 6293”, but probably not a booming “Eight Oh!”.

He loved a bargain

When my sister got married in 2008, he tried to persuade me to have a double wedding with her to save money, even though I wasn’t even engaged at the time. I’m not sure double weddings even exist in the real world and only maybe if identical twins are going to marry identical twins. To be fair to him, I did get married three years later and it was very short-lived so maybe he had a point.

One childhood Christmas he bought wrapping paper so cheap that when pressed down, would reveal what was inside. This may not sound like a big deal, as surely we were about to open the presents anyway. But in my family, all presents were wrapped and placed under the tree by mid-December. They weren’t going to let Father Christmas take any credit for their generosity.

What I lost in the magic of Christmas was more than made up for by the hours of feeling presents and trying to work out what they were. And in this particular year, weeks of pressing down that paper and knowing all about my My Little Pony Show Stable.

However, what he didn’t scrimp on was Christmas decorations. When it came to quantity (but not quality). You couldn’t see the ceiling, such was the excess of foil and paper decorations. When taken down, the room looked so contrastingly bleak, bare and stark, it was like we were now living somewhere you’d see in a sex trafficking case.

Funnily enough, our beloved family home which I’d lived for my first eighteen years, was in the local paper a few years ago as it had become a very low-rent brothel. (Not sure what a high-rent brothel is. Not my area of expertise.)

Here’s one more. My parents went to Florida once a year, where he loved to eat, play golf, play bowls and shop. He brought home a pair of peach trousers one year, which we were horrified to discover were made of such thin, flimsy material that they were see-through. “They were only a dollar,” he proudly told us. “Too much! They should’ve paid you!” we replied.

Appearances

It was actually very unusual for him to be wearing trousers as shorts were his bottoms of choice from February to November. He wore shorts so much that he called trousers, ‘long trousers’. And the shorts always had a wad of cash in the back pocket. We didn’t even know wallets existed until we left home.

In the nineties, he grew a rat’s tail. If you’re fortunate enough to be unfamiliar with this, the hair is short all over, apart from one small section at the back which is grown long in order to resemble the tail of the rat.

I can’t remember why he did it. The fact that he was in his early fifties at the time might prompt the words, mid-life crisis. I know one of New Kids on the Block had a rat’s tail, although I’m very sure he wasn’t a fan. I think it was for a joke. Which is quite some commitment to humour.

The rules do not apply

Do you remember when car seat belts became law in the UK? Of course you don’t, you’re far too young. It was 1983. It seems weird now that there was a time when they weren’t compulsory. But in 1983, my dad was so irritated by this change that he applied to be exempt from this law, arguing that his job meant he had to get in and out of his car a lot. To be very clear he wasn’t any kind of delivery driver or travelling salesman. His job meant that twice a week, he would’ve had to get in and out of his car a few times. His application was rejected.

Another example. Last year I went to see him play in a bowls final and was thrilled when he won the trophy. On the way home, he wanted to stop off and buy a four-pack of beer to celebrate. He didn’t let it inconvenience him that there was nowhere to park nearby. He pulled into a bus stop and jumped out saying, “Won’t be long!” It was the longest 10 hours (probably just 10 minutes) of my life. I was so stressed that I was Googling the bus timetable at one point to see when the next one was due.

There’s a bit in the film Good Will Hunting, where Minnie Driver/Skylar says she’d give back all her money if she could have one more day with her dad. I’m with her there. Unless it was that day when he left me parked at a bus stop for ten hours (ten minutes) again.

And actually, come to think of it, he’d be furious I’d wasted all my money on an extra day. Even an extra year.

“Oh good to see you again. Hold on, what? You’re homeless and penniless?” 

Minnie Driver/Skylar didn’t think that through, did she?

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I’ll finish there even though I’m far from finished. I’ve only gone about three metres below sea level of this iceberg. But you’ve indulged me enough now.

I’ll let my dad have the last words. He was a man of catchphrases, often pinched from somewhere else. ‘Who loves ya, baby?’, ‘Not too shabby’, ‘From your mouth to god’s ears’ (despite his atheism), ‘Outstanding!’.

And finally here’s one that his friend told us he used to say, which comes from an old song:

‘Enjoy yourself, it’s later than you think.’

Tell me

Talk to me in the comments about…

• how your parents/grandparents/great grandparents answer the phone.

• double weddings.

• questionable bargains bought by parents.

• the rules not applying to parents.

• parental catchphrases.